3 Ways to Use a Beta Group When Publishing a Book

Welcome to the Author Audience show, the podcast that helps you reach more people with your message. Create a book, connect with your audience, change lives. Here's your host, Shelly Hitz.

Have you considered using a beta group for your book? Hi, my name is Shelly Hitz. I'm the author coach@authoraudienceacademy.com and I'm on a mission to help you reach more people with your message. It's time to let your light shine. And I'm in the middle of a huge book project. It's probably the biggest book project that I've done up to this point, and because of that, I am taking it slow. Like, you guys know I can write and publish books fast. I have written and published books in as little as seven days. And yet this particular book project, really different. And there's certain books that you'll write that really take time. It's almost like marinating a piece of meat. You know, it's just really going to take time to really get the flavor through the whole thing. If you try to rush it, it's not gonna be good. And so for this particular book, I didn't want to rush it. I wanted to make sure that everything was right, that everything was good, that everything was. Was really above par before I published this book. And so what I decided to do is use a beta group. And so I thought this would be a great training to talk to you about three ways you can use a beta group when publishing your next book. I have over 150 people in my beta group. That's a lot of people. And I'm really blessed. I'm so blessed that so many people have agreed to be in my beta group. But, you know, your beta group can be as small as just a few people. But what is a beta group? A beta group is basically like a test group. So they're getting the early version. A lot of times it's called an advanced review copy arc of your book. They're getting that early edition of your book that arc the advanced reviewer's copy, and then they will give you feedback. And so the first way you can use a beta group is for feedback. Feedback on your story, your storyline, your content. Is it confusing? Does it make sense? You know, those types of things. The second type of feedback you can get is actually proofreading. So beta readers are great proofreaders as well, and they can catch a lot of little mistakes or a lot of little things that may even slip through your editor's eyes, because how many of us know? I mean, even you know, like professionally edited, traditionally published books, so still sometimes have errors in them. So the beta group can give you feedback. And I've been asking my beta group to give me feedback and I've been getting some really good feedback and it really has helped me to improve things a little bit. So what I've been doing is the second way you can use a beta group is for accountability. And so what I've been doing is I have been feeding, finishing one chapter of my book every week. So yours could be different, you know, it could be on a different schedule. But I'm choosing to finish one chapter of my book every week. I send that chapter to my editor and she's agreed. If you need a good editor, check out Deb Hall. She is great. And if you need her contact information, just let me know. She's helping me edit the book, so I'll send that chapter to her. She sends it back to me within a week and then I accept the edits, I format it for a PDF and I send that every week to my beta group. It's built in accountability. I know they're waiting for the next chapter. I know, like, I can't just make an excuse, like I don't feel like it, you know, and this book has been one of my most difficult books to write and it is on a Christian topic. And so it's also what I believe. I've had probably some of the most spiritual attack, you know, resistance, keeping me from wanting to write the book too. So with those things in mind, I decided, hey, my sister had kind of given me the idea. She's like, shelly, why don't you do it this way so that you can, you know, create. Because I'm also creating videos that will go along with the book. You know, you can create the videos and then everything can be ready for your launch. And I thought, you know, I'm a person, I love to get things out there as quick as possible. But for this particular project, I needed the accountability. And. And I really did want to have the videos, the corresponding videos done for launch. And so that's how I'm doing it. So the first one is for feedback, the second one is for accountability. And the third way you can use a beta group is to be able to have a really strong, like street team or book reviewers team that then can help you once the book is done. So, so what I've asked is, I've asked my beta readers. It's not, I don't like, it wasn't a requirement. You could make it a requirement for your beta group. But I asked them that once the book is published, if they would be willing to post a review on Amazon. Now, I know all 150 of my beta readers will not do that. That's just the way life works. You know, people will agree to write reviews for your books and they won't do it. But even if just a small portion of those people will post reviews for me, right when the book is first published, it's gonna give me a ton proof. They will have walked through the study and the videos and the book with me over the 12 weeks. And so it will be really, really great. But then they can also share with their friends, the people they know, the women's ministries they know, you know, the different groups that might want to get the book. So they're going to help me potentially even build buzz as a street team. And when I get ready to launch, they can help me if they've enjoyed it, enjoyed the process. I'm finding it very valuable and I think it's really what's going to help me cross the finish line on this particular project because it's been really, really difficult. So this was something I created for my broken Crayons still color project. And I actually, I videotaped myself creating this and then I put it on high speed, the video. So this is a little tip if you have anything like this that you know, and I put it on high speed and then I used it in my presentation today. So that was kind of cool. Well, you guys have a great rest of your day. I always love to know who is here, who is interacting, who's seeing these trainings. And I want to know if they're valuable to you because I'm doing this completely free and I want to know that these trainings are valuable for you and that you want me to continue to create them. All right, I will see you next time. Bye. Bye.

Thanks for listening to this episode of the Author Audience Show. Connect with us online@authoraudience.com where you'll find all the resources mentioned in today's episode. While you're there, grab Shelly's free video training on how to write and publish your book using her six Step Ascent method. Join us again next week to learn how to reach your audience with your message.